


The Way to Dusty Death

by Corona



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Biotic Shepard (Mass Effect), Depression, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Nihilism, Post-Horizon (Mass Effect), Racism, Spacer (Mass Effect), Tragedy, War Hero (Mass Effect)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:28:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21917581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Corona/pseuds/Corona
Summary: After Sanctuary, Shepard crumbles into pieces. Kaidan tries to help him, but instead learns a piece of news that makes the atrocity deeply personal for Shepard and bears witness to the indomitable captain finally coming close to giving up.
Relationships: Kaidan Alenko/Male Shepard
Comments: 2
Kudos: 37





	The Way to Dusty Death

**Author's Note:**

> Be warned, this is very heavy, as the tags may indicate. **Trigger warning** for references to various real-world events such as the Holocaust, Armenian genocide, Darfur genocide, Rwandan genocide, Rohingya genocide, Australian abuse of refugees, oppression of indigenous/native peoples and the Romani, the Rape of Nanking, and various other assorted war crimes and crimes against humanity, plus the murder of children, institutionalised racism and homophobia, and a _lot_ of grief and despair. This one also doesn't have what you might call a happy ending.
> 
> Title comes from Macbeth's soliloquy in Act 5, Scene 5 of _Macbeth_.

Kaidan has never feared Shepard before.

Feared _for_ him, oh yes. It's impossible not to, with everything he goes toe-to-toe with on an almost daily basis and the way he constantly zooms around the battlefield and discharges his barriers at anything in sight with so much recklessness that Kaidan still isn't certain he's not trying to get himself killed. But he's never feared _him_. He's had no reason to; Shepard is powerful and sometimes stern and aloof, but he is also kind and painfully sincere, and his determination may be the only fuel keeping the collective fire going. With him, Kaidan feels safe, knows he can lay his life and everything he has in his hands and see them preserved, kept from all harm. It is a rare feeling in this war.

But today… today, Kaidan fears him.

The whole shuttle ride back to the _Normandy_ from Sanctuary, Shepard is silent like a city after some great disaster has come to pass. He stares ahead, warm brown eyes gone flat and cold and empty—as they have been since Thessia, but worse somehow, impossibly. A steadily pulsing blue light swathes and clings to him, and that is as good a sign of how deep Shepard's upset runs as any—it is a habit of his to lose control of his biotics when he is angry or otherwise distressed. Typically, however, he tries to rein them back in when he notices his control slipping. Today…

Not that he does not have cause. Fury burns in Kaidan's veins, too, concurrent with his nausea, with his horror. He cannot quite get the images of Sanctuary out of his mind: the labs, the empty pods, the husks that were once refugees, the vids Miranda left explaining what was going on, the sheer number of victims—all of it. It floods his mind, and every one stokes the flames, and Kaidan grits his teeth and tries to ignore the headache building behind his temples. Wrath will make it worse.

But that does not stop him from wanting to rip the Illusive Man limb from limb, or, failing that, to break every one of his bones with his biotics, _slowly_ , before defenestrating him, as Shepard did to Henry Lawson. That does not stop him from wanting to tear Cerberus' headquarters apart with nothing more than his biotics and his bare hands, to cut loose as he never has since Vyrnnus, to let the fury rule and guide him and make him immune to all fear and caution—as Shepard did in Sanctuary today.

He remembers every moment, Shepard's mounting but silent rage as they progressed through the facility, his blue glow and his terse sentences spoken in equally clipped tones, followed by a moment after the final vid where he just stood there—then, before Kaidan or Tali could say a word, abruptly let out a roar akin to that of a lion and charged off, deep into the facility, heedless to their shouts. He remembers following frantically after him, staring in horror as Shepard rampaged through, sending biotic blasts in every direction, ripping the structures from their hinges, tearing the Reaper troops—even the banshees and brutes—almost to pieces, smashing everything that could be smashed, snarling and shouting and _screaming_. He remembers dodging fire and debris and wondering if the place was about to collapse on their heads because of Shepard's rampage. He remembers the elevator ride, tense and silent, Shepard still glowing, hands clenched into fists, prepared to strike out again.

He remembers how Shepard biotically ripped Oriana from her father's arms, floated the man into the air, and used his biotics to break and crush every bone in the man's body _slowly_. He remembers how Shepard asked if he liked how this felt, if he enjoyed being hurt and tortured and utterly helpless; how he mocked him for pleading and begging for mercy and called him a hypocrite; how he told Lawson that the only thing he would be remembered for was his atrocity, perhaps one of the greatest in human history. He remembers how Shepard pulled back, then hurled him through the window; how he seemed to take pleasure in Lawson's scream as he fell to his death.

Now they are here, and Shepard is quiet, and he glows, and his eyes are empty, and he clenches his teeth so hard that Kaidan thinks they might shatter. Blood soaks him from head to toe; debris and bits of husk all but cover him, and he does not seem to care. He seems, indeed, entirely lost in his own world—rather uncharacteristic of him, for Shepard always has his head solidly in this world, never up in the clouds. Kaidan looks from him to Tali, and Tali shrugs, clearly ill at ease, and Kaidan swallows, glances away, and prays that the shuttle goes faster. He can't get away from this place and its horrors soon enough, and he can't quite stomach the sight of this altogether different Shepard.

Only this morning, he was smiling as Kaidan woke him, gentle though tired. Now he is…

As they enter the ship, Shepard stands up, and while the glow surrounding him at last fades, his expression remains thunderous, still he clenches his jaw harder than can be comfortable. The moment the shuttle doors slide open, he staggers out, but he has not taken one step when he collapses to his hands and knees. As he stands, Kaidan hesitates, and he takes a step forward to go help, but before he gets there, Shepard gets back to his feet. His next step is no less clumsy, and he reels into the side of the shuttle, then staggers off to change out of his armour.

Kaidan stares after him, then follows, joined a moment later by Cortez while Tali takes the elevator.

"Get us out of here, Joker," Shepard grits out as he strips off his visor and gauntlets. His voice is like gravel, but soft and pitched low, and Kaidan finds that infinitely more dangerous than the roar that clawed at his eardrums and rang louder than even the banshees' shrieks not quite an hour ago. Mouth dry, he steps away and begins to strip down, and his hands shake as he removes his own helmet and his gauntlets.

"Where to, Captain?" Joker asks, naturally.

But out of the corner of his eye, Kaidan sees Shepard whirl around, face twisting with fury, and that is all the warning he gets before—" _Anywhere that isn't HERE!_ " In the quiet, confined space of the ship, his sudden yell seems louder than humanly possible, and Kaidan jumps as he hasn't quite jumped since he first saw EDI in Dr Eva's body. Bowels like water, tremors spreading up his arms to the rest of his body, he turns to look back at Shepard, and he sees James doing much the same.

A pause. Then, "Uh… yes, Captain," and Shepard resumes with his stripping, but Kaidan notices his hands shaking too.

James approaches them. "Shit," he says. "You're both a mess. What happened down there?"

Shepard stops again, as Kaidan pulls off his boots, and seems to struggle with his words for a few moments before throwing his hands up in the air and continuing to strip. "Fuck it," he snaps, "I'm in no mood to say. Kaidan, _you_ tell him, if you're so inclined." Not trusting himself to speak, Kaidan nods, and he catches James' eye and shakes his head. Luckily for everyone involved, James doesn't say another word.

Once Shepard is back in his uniform and has put his armour away, he storms into the elevator, and only after he has gone does Kaidan let himself breathe deeply. He looks at James and explains the situation, voice low as though Shepard were still here. "Sanctuary…" he says, and the fury burns through his veins again though his fear of Shepard had almost chased it away as he considers what he witnessed. "We found a Cerberus facility there. They were experimenting on the refugees, turning them into husks…"

James stares flatly at him for a moment, for once struck speechless, then shakes his head. "You're… you're not kidding, are you? Oh, _shit_ … those… Cerberus fucking assholes!"

"That's putting it lightly," Kaidan says, clenching his fist. "I don't even want to _think_ about how many people died down there."

For a moment, James himself seems similarly overcome with rage, but then he lets out a deep breath, and his eyes wander to the elevator. "Must have hit a nerve with the captain, no? Can't say I blame him."

"Again, that's putting it lightly," Kaidan says. "He completely tore the facility apart. Absolutely rampaged through it. Even ripped through the brutes and banshees like they were tissue paper… Then he broke every bone in Henry Lawson's body—that's the one responsible for all this—and threw him through a window. I'd have thought he'd have calmed down by now, but… well, you saw."

"Give him time," James says, with a shrug. "I'd need a while to process that if I were him. I'm sure he'll have cooled off in a few hours."

Kaidan nods once, but something in his gut tells him that won't be the case. He doesn't care to listen to it, not now. "I hope so," he says, and he heads to the elevator, thoughts of finding the stiffest drink he can in mind.

* * *

Hours later, however, and Shepard still hasn't come down from his cabin. Dinner that night is a quiet, tense affair, the news of Sanctuary having spread and the crew being in too much shock, too consumed with horror and fury, to say much to anyone. Traynor wears a face like thunder throughout the meal, Copeland looks positively sick and appears to be forcing himself to eat, Campbell and Westmoreland's usual sarcastic chatter is absent, even Donnelly seems grim. Kaidan eats and tries to ignore the aura he can see that means another migraine is on the way, and when he has done, he leans back and runs his hands over his face. As the crew scatters in silence, Garrus approaches him.

"You might want to check on Shepard," he says. "It's not like him to miss a meal."

"Yeah," Kaidan says, opening one eye to peer at Garrus. "Yeah, I will. I hope he's okay."

"I'm sure he is, but he'll be better if you head up there to talk to him," Garrus says, with a knowing glance. Kaidan lets out a sound that almost resembles laughter as he gets out of his seat and pushes the chair in.

"You don't need to tell me that, Garrus," he says with a wave of his arm, and his humour comes on stronger than he'd expected, all things considered. "See you tomorrow." Garrus nods, and Kaidan turns and heads to the elevator. His amusement fades fast, however, and he hesitates a second before stepping inside and pressing the button for 'the loft'.

Not quite half a minute later, the elevator doors open, and Kaidan steps out to the sound of silence. Again, he falters, but the memory of the past two years, of all the times he doubted Shepard and wasn't there for him, drives him forward. The door slides open at his approach, and Kaidan heads inside. Almost at once, he sees that the room is empty. But before he can grow confused, his ears pick up the sound of tinkling water coming from just off to his right and behind the metal panel that serves as a rather too well-concealed door, in his opinion.

Understandable, of course; God knows Kaidan spent longer in the shower than he should have after what he saw today. So though he knows it's presumptuous, he makes himself at home on the couch, considers turning on the radio before deciding against it, watches the fish swimming in their tank, and waits.

When five minutes have passed, and still the shower runs, Kaidan frowns, but he remains where he sits. When ten minutes have passed, he shakes his head, gets to his feet, and heads to the shower door. It is not like Shepard, a quintessential soldier, to take so long in the shower. "Shepard?" he calls, but there is no response. He tries again, but still, there is nothing. Before Kaidan can begin to worry, he steps forward; the door obediently slides open, and he peers inside.

His blood chills at the sight of Shepard, who sits on the floor almost in a foetal position, staring blankly into space. His back and head rest against the wall, and he doesn't even glance at him though surely he must have heard him enter. He is clean of blood and filth and detritus now, but covering his chin and his chest is a yellowish, sticky-looking substance, and Kaidan instinctively steps back as the all too distinctive smell of vomit reaches his nostrils.

"Shepard," he says again, more loudly, but though Shepard's eyes flicker to him, still he does nothing. At last, Kaidan sighs, steps into the shower, presses the button to turn it off, grabs a towel, and then kneels next to Shepard, puts his arm around him, and pulls him up to his feet. Shepard does not resist—seems limp, like a corpse, as Kaidan wipes the vomit off and drags him out of the shower, and that is almost more frightening than his fury of hours before. That rage was so uncharacteristic of him… but this is even more so. Shepard is a man of action even in depression, not… this.

Kaidan leads Shepard to his pile of clothes on the floor next to his desk, and he feels more relief than he'll care to admit when Shepard kneels unbidden and pulls them on. He remains silent then, and when he has finished dressing, his muscles go limp again. Kaidan chances a look into his eyes, and they, too, are like those of a corpse, emptier and flatter than they've ever been and have any right to be. Swallowing, Kaidan grabs Shepard's hand and pulls him towards the couch. Shepard falls into the seat, just about, but otherwise remains silent still, and finally, Kaidan shakes his head and decides not to beat around the bush.

"Shepard," he says, "What's going on? Why are you acting like…?"

Abruptly, Shepard grabs a datapad from the coffee table and motions for Kaidan to sit next to him. Kaidan does so cautiously and watches while Shepard brings something up on the screen, and he notices that the man's hands are still shaking, though not as violently as they were hours ago. He knows far better than to press him on the matter.

A few seconds later, Shepard hands him the datapad, and Kaidan looks down to see a photo of him and his family—his parents, the Rear Admiral Mark and Captain Hannah Shepard; his four siblings, and a young man who Kaidan suspects is one of Shepard's brothers-in-law. He notes their fancy getups, the dress and veil worn by Shepard's younger sister, Jessica, and he tries to ignore both the thought that Shepard looks damn good in a suit and the fact that Tobias, Shepard's youngest brother, on the right side of the picture, has been dead for the past several months. "This is… your sister's wedding, Shepard?" he asks.

"Yeah," Shepard says. "In Victoria. One of the last times the whole family was together, actually…" He trails off, and for half a moment, his eyes appear fogged up, not that Kaidan can blame him. Eventually, he sighs and continues. "My sister, Jess, she never liked space life. She moved to Victoria for university, got a degree in architecture, married Chris, had Amelia a few years back. They intended to stay there, but…"

"You told me they got out of Victoria when the Reapers hit," Kaidan says, remembering.

"They did," Shepard says. "They managed to get off-world before Mordin cured the genophage. But, Kaidan… remember how I said I'd lost contact with them? That I haven't heard from them since December?"

Kaidan nods, but as the words sink in, they leave a general impression of ominousness, and he sucks in his breath. He looks at Shepard, wonders why the man seems so determined to draw this out.

Shepard looks back at his photo, eyes focusing on the faces of his sister and brother-in-law. "Do you also remember how I said that the last time I talked to Jess, she told me they were on their way to Sanctuary?"

For a moment, Kaidan doesn't comprehend. "On their way to—" Then, unbidden, the images of the husks and the pods and the audio logs and everything return to the forefront of his mind, and he _does_ comprehend. Suddenly it all makes perfect sense, and he startles in his seat as though he's been electrocuted. "Oh… oh my _God_ …" He stares at Shepard, stomach dropping to his feet and through the floor with all the force of a falling anvil, and Shepard keeps gazing at the photo, his cursory nod the only acknowledgement he gives of Kaidan's words.

Platitudes reel through Kaidan's mind in a maelstrom—false things like maybe they're still alive, maybe it was quick, maybe they somehow escaped, maybe maybe _maybe_ , nothing that could ever comfort anyone. "Shepard, I…" He sucks in another breath, suddenly dizzy. "I don't know what to say."

"Better if you don't say anything," Shepard says. He takes the picture back, and his thumb almost idly traces over it, while Kaidan struggles to come to terms with what this means—his younger brother and younger sister and brother-in-law and oh God, his _niece_ , all in a few months of each other, and what will his parents say when they hear of this?

Just as quickly, his mind returns to Shepard's rampage, to his mindless fury—and all it once, it makes perfect sense. "No… no wonder you went so crazy…"

"Yeah." Shepard's voice is flat. "I've been wondering what happened to them for months. As soon as we got there, I was asking myself what had happened… then I saw the husks, and I knew… and I couldn't think straight. Lost my head. Not that I regret it. That place _deserved_ to be trashed, and if I could have _liquefied_ Henry Lawson, I would have."

"I'd have helped," Kaidan says softly, fist clenching as the wrath turns his blood hot again. "Not sure Miranda was so happy about you stealing her revenge, but…"

Shepard shrugs. "Too late now. I barely even noticed she was there. All I could see was that little bastard…" He begins to glow again, but Kaidan doesn't even bother telling him. Let him have his fury. Let him have his grief. A monster took his sister and brother-in-law and niece away, indoctrinated them and sent them to Cerberus or experimented on them until they died or turned them into husks at a time when they should all be fighting the _real_ enemy. Briefly, Kaidan wonders if his sister and brother-in-law might have been among the many Cerberus soldiers or husks they've killed over the past months, and the very idea fills him with such revulsion that he can't keep from retching.

Shepard now stands up and heads over to his fish tank, the glow of it illuminating him in an eerie way. "Not that it matters," he says. "Kill one Henry Lawson, and another just like him will pop up somewhere the next minute."

Kaidan furrows his brow. "We'll get the Illusive Man, Shepard, one way or another. He had better be saying his prayers… Cases like this, I don't mind killing crazy." His voice goes quiet again, but Shepard shakes his head.

"Not what I meant. Sure, we'll kill him. But what difference will that make? There'll be others like him and Lawson along in the next instant, replacing them. And they'll start killing and raping and mutilating. And on and on it goes. May as well not have changed anything…"

There's a brief pause as Kaidan grapples with these words, then he sits up, lays the datapad aside, and stands. "Shepard, that's not true," he says, approaching the captain and putting a hand on the small of his back. "I don't even know how many lives you saved by shutting down the facility. I'm sorry— _God_ , am I sorry—that we couldn't save your sister and her family, but you saved thousands of others, at least."

"The facility was already dead, thanks to the Reapers. No one else would have come there anyway," Shepard says, not looking at him. "And whoever I saved today, they'll die tomorrow. To Cerberus or the Reapers. Or if they don't, then they'll die to the next megalomaniacal bastard's tyranny, or the Council's stupidity, or the Alliance's coverups, or to Aria T'Loak and her ilk, or to the stupidity and pettiness that plague us all, or to simple mistakes, or… Well, they'll die. I'm not _saving_ anyone. I'm not even sure…"

A pause, and Kaidan stares at him, waiting and puzzled. Shepard has never been an optimist, not exactly. It's hard to come out of BAaT and the Alliance's coverup of it, as they both did, to say nothing of the last few years, and be an optimist. But he's never sounded so _cynical_ , either. His grief could easily explain this, but… "I'm sorry, Shepard. I'm not sure I follow."

"I'm just starting to wonder if what we're fighting for is worth saving," Shepard says, glancing at Kaidan for a moment before looking back at the fish tank. "If there's any goodness in this galaxy that's worth preserving."

"What? Shepard, of—of course there is!" Kaidan half-stammers, stunned into stumbling over his words. " _You_ , for a start, and I'm not just saying that because I'm biased. Ask anyone who's not indoctrinated. You're a good man. The people we're saving—they're good. The people _here_ —they're good. Aren't they?"

Shepard seems to consider, then shrugs. "Perhaps. But how many lives has goodness saved compared to the number that evil has ended? How many has goodness even _improved_ compared to the number that evil has ruined? I haven't heard of goodness saving billions. Just evil ending billions."

"Ah, good old mean world syndrome," Kaidan says, far too lightly, and when Shepard glares at him, he coughs. "Sorry. Shepard, you've _already_ saved millions, at least. Stopping Sovereign, the Collectors—and soon you'll stop the Reapers. There's your answer."

"And I'm sure most of those people I've saved have already died because of either the Collectors or the Reapers or Cerberus or any of the other horrors in this galaxy," Shepard snaps. He folds his arms. "No way in hell I could have saved as many as died in Sanctuary or over the course of this war. And even if I'm able to end this war… so what? Illness and old age and accidents are a part of life, but how many of those people will die because of other people?"

Kaidan casts Shepard a wary glance. "Shepard… what _exactly_ are you saying?"

Shepard looks down, folding his arms. "I'm just thinking… we call the Reapers slaughterers. And so they are, on an unprecedented scale. And that's all they do, unlike us. But really, are we any better?"

Kaidan's blood freezes and his stomach plummets so far that surely it must have fallen out of the ship. "Oh, _God_ ," he murmurs. "Shepard—have you been hearing voices lately? Getting headaches? Anything like—"

"Indoctrination? No. Chakwas will say the same if you don't believe me," Shepard says, and Kaidan makes a mental note to check with Chakwas and make _damn_ sure he's telling the truth.

For the moment…

"Then why—how can you say—?"

Shepard reaches out and puts a hand on the fish tank, and though he gazes into it, he seems to see nothing. "Look around you, Kaidan. Look at our history. Human history, galactic history. _Goodness_ doesn't really make it into the books, does it? It's all slaughter, rape, cruelty, greed, stupidity, pride, every sin and every crime that has a name. And that's they will remember out of this war, and that's all that will ever be."

"Shepard, that's not true—"

"Isn't it?" Shepard lances him with his glare again. "Let's see, does anyone remember anything about Cambodia other than Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge? Russia other than Stalin and the purges and the worst of the tsars? Germany other than the Nazis and the Holocaust? Romania other than Vlad the Impaler and Ceaușescu? The Middle East other than the endless warring? Rwanda other than the genocide, the Congo other than Leopold II and the wars of the 20th, Sudan other than the Darfur genocide? Burma other than the military junta, the genocide of the Rohingya, and the Karen conflict? North Korea other than the Kim dynasty? Those are just off the top of my head. Then you've got Japan: the Rape of Nanking and Unit 731. Australia and its Stolen Generations and treatment of refugees. The Holodomor in Ukraine. The treatment of the Romani and the Palestinians. The Barbary slave trade. The trans-Atlantic slave trade. The AIDS epidemic. Residential schools in Canada. The oppression of the Irish and the Welsh by the English. The Bosnian genocide. The genocide of the Uyghurs in China. The genocides of indigenous peoples. Oh, and the _democides_. All the insane dictatorships and one-party states that have ever existed—the way they treated their prisoners and their alleged 'enemies' and 'traitors'. But why stop with genocide and mass slaughter?" Shepard pauses, licking his lips; his voice so far has been so quiet and monotone that it has compelled Kaidan to silence.

"Look at all the hatred that's ever existed around the world. The mere existence of slavery, so named for the Slavs. If I'd been _me_ in the AIDS epidemic, I'd have probably died, and who'd have cared? Or, if not that, I might have been shot by the police if I'd taken one wrong move because I'm a black man, assuming I didn't get caught up in a gang conflict or sent down the school-to-prison pipeline. Or if I'd been in the southern US instead of Canada, in the Bible Belt, and my family had been religious, one of my relatives might have told me to my face they wanted to kill me because I had the temerity to like men." He folds his arms again, jaw clenching, dark brown skin glowing a stronger blue yet as he stares into the glass like he's trying to melt it. "Look at all the missing and murdered aboriginal men and women, what the crime rates used to be like on the reservations. Look at apartheid and segregation and Jim Crow. Look at how some people were so far up their own arses they could deny the Holocaust, or the Armenian genocide, or be opposed to vaccinations. Look how so many corporate _fat cats_ were so obsessed with money they preferred to let the world burn rather than cut their profits to save it, who placed said profits over the lives and wellbeing of their workers. Look at how many children died because of the US' obsession with guns and 'freedom'. And even now, the Alliance prefers to cover up its mistakes—cover up BAaT—rather than admit how many lives were wrecked and be forced to, oh the horror, pay _reparations_. Look how it encourages biotics to join the military, reinforces the perception that all we're good for is killing, encourages people to fear us! And then look at the Council, who preferred to bury its head in the sand even though they _knew_ about the Reapers, knew that their coming might mean the end of the galaxy and the deaths of trillions, until the Reapers finally came and left them without a leg to stand on!" His voice rises, and every syllable drips with acid and bitter contempt, and Kaidan knows that he must stop this. Shepard has the right to vent, but he should not let him follow these thoughts to their bitter conclusion.

"Shepard. Shepard, I know you're hurting, but—"

"What about the turians?" Shepard continues, ignoring him. "They pressed the button on the genophage and never blinked once at all the piles of children who never lived, at all the men and women who died trying for a cure. And they _segregate_ their biotics into units, all but end their careers for it, don't even _try_ to integrate them with their normal soldiers." He paces, pulsing blue, clenching and unclenching his fists. "What about the salarians? They uplifted the krogan without giving a thought to the consequences, and they learnt _nothing_. Now they're trying to uplift the yahg. The asari? They act so much better than everyone else, but their government hoarded the beacon on Thessia for themselves, breaking the laws _they_ wrote so they can have an edge, and they're so self-satisfied and complacent, they laugh at the very idea of technological advancement. The batarians have slavery and the caste system. Most of the krogan can't wrap their head around the idea that their behaviour brought the genophage on them, however wrong it was, and they want to start the Rebellions up again and keep fighting and killing and _dying_ rather than rebuild! The hanar conveniently swept in when Rakhana was dying and saved not even five hundred thousand drell, and rather than helping them find a new planet or integrating them into their society as equals, they instead pressed them into servitude, made them perform tasks the hanar must have _already_ found some means to do themselves over the centuries of the Primacy's existence,! All the while the rest of the galaxy _ignored_ what was happening on Rakhana! The quarians had no compunction about killing the geth as opposed to _talking_ to them when the geth first awoke, so insistent were they on keeping their AI servants, and the geth killed billions of them when they fought back, down to their civilians, down to helpless children, and did nothing to stop the heretics when they left, and until recently killed anyone who tried to reach out to them! And what about the Terminus Systems? Nobody even tries to clean up the crime and stop the pirates and slave traders. Perhaps it's a futile task, but the effort is surely worth it! Or perhaps it's not, to _people!_ " He spits out the last words and comes to a stop, and in the dim light, Kaidan can spot tears trickling from his eyes as he glares at him, rage and pain written in every line of his face.

"So tell me, Kaidan. Is any of that worth saving? How different are any of us from the Reapers? From Cerberus?"

There's a long silence as Kaidan tries to gather his thoughts. He swallows thickly, then approaches Shepard and lays a hand on his shoulder, trying to ignore the coldness in his gut that contemplating human and galactic history has caused. "We're fighting to save _normal_ people, Shepard," he says gently. "Civilians, people with lives and hopes and families. People like your sister. Isn't that worth it?"

"What would they be in other circumstances? There's a beast in every man…" Shepard trails off, and Kaidan finishes the sentence in his head. "If things had been different, perhaps you and I would have gone insane, too. If 'normal' people were in government or headed up corporations like ExoGeni… I'm sure they wouldn't be so 'normal' then."

"That's a problem with _power_ , Shepard, and greed. Not people."

Shepard's mouth twists with bitterness. "There's always a choice. People always choose wrong. Lawson could have _chosen_ differently, but all he could think about was his own glory, to the point where he cared nothing for the _lives_ he was sacrificing. You heard his logs: the only thing he regretted was the deception—if you can call it regret. What's so redeemable about people if we can commit such atrocities, if we can be so blind and greedy and cruel and all the rest of it? And what's the point, if it'll never change? The Protheans were as brutal imperialists as the Belgians and the English, and indeed worse, and the whole _galaxy_ has paid thousands and thousands of times over for the Leviathans' pride, and they don't _care_. Billions of years, and nothing's changed. So tell me what the point is, Kaidan. I'm finding it hard to see when we're just as disgusting and evil as our enemies, when 'goodness' is forgotten but evil kills billions."

For want of any other way to argue with him, Kaidan focuses on something else entirely. "Shepard…" No, that won't do. He needs to appeal to him as more than just one of his subordinates. " _Nicholas_ , you've known about these things all your life. If you're going to be so… _nihilistic_ … why start now?"

"I thought we were past this," Shepard says at once. "I thought such atrocities were behind the galaxy, that we were moving forward. Getting better. I've seen some terrible things these past few years, but our enemies did so many of those things. It was easier. But today… today I saw a human butcher _millions_ for the sake of his ego, his _fucking_ glory. Now I see… in perfect clarity. We haven't changed a bit." More tears trickle down his face. His voice cracks.

"Perhaps. But what about this?" Kaidan asks, and he gestures to himself. "Us?" He would rather remind him of a talk they had on the first _Normandy_ , when Kaidan had told Shepard that if one bastard was enough to make him hate aliens, he'd hate humans too. But Shepard isn't considering individual humans, is he? He's considering atrocities, things with death tolls into the _hundreds_ , at least, and other things that have only ruined people's lives. He won't see Kaidan's point. Better to show him this. "Hate people all you want, but isn't it worth fighting for this?"

A long pause. Kaidan reaches out.

Shepard turns away.

"I love you too, Kaidan," he says, and the words have never sounded hollower or more depressing. "But I don't see the point in fighting for this, no matter how good it is, when nothing else is as worthy."

Kaidan bites his lip, his eyes tearing. "You don't believe that. Tell me you don't really believe that."

"I don't know what I believe," Shepard says, hugging himself. "I can't see past the blood. The husks. The corpses… All of human history. I can't see past it."

"In another time, _we_ couldn't have happened. Not in public," Kaidan reminds him. "Now, we can. And if you go to the Bible Belt, nobody will give a damn. Isn't that a change?"

Shepard just shrugs, walks over to his bed, and sits down, facing away from Kaidan. "And people are still butchering each other for their own egos. A little thing like that doesn't mean much, considering human nature. Oh, I'll fight until the end. But only because I must. I'm not sure I care what happens anymore. Both sides are irredeemable, both sides are washed in the blood of billions. And my sister and niece will never be more than names on a casualty list, and my niece will never live. So why should I?"

Another silence. Kaidan sighs and concedes defeat. "Do you want to be left alone?"

"Please."

"All right. Call…" He hesitates, but then remembers again all the times he wasn't there for Shepard before, for Nicholas. "Call me if you need me."

"Yeah."

Kaidan doesn't even watch him for a moment and hope vainly for an apology. He simply turns and leaves, heading back down to the CIC.

Once there, he makes a beeline for Joker, and he tries not to look too ashen-faced. "How's the captain?" Joker asks quietly once he's standing next to him.

Kaidan shakes his head and runs his hands over his face. The aura has gone, but he's sure that in a few hours, he'll be down for the count with a migraine, and shivers are running up and down his spine. "Not good," he says. "His sister was in Sanctuary… his niece. He's not exactly taking it well."

Joker lifts his hand off the controls and stares. " _Shit_ ," he mutters. "No wonder he snapped. Well, I don't have any orders. What do you think we should do?"

 _Get anywhere that isn't the Iera system,_ Kaidan thinks for a moment. But he soon recalls something Shepard had shown him just before Thessia: an email from Admiral Hackett, ordering the _Normandy_ into drydock and the crew to have some shore leave. As far as Kaidan remembers, he'd said something about an apartment of Anderson's…

Right. That'll do. God knows they all need a rest, Shepard not the least of them. At the very _least_ , he needs time to mourn.

"Get us to the Citadel, Joker," Kaidan says, and he turns away, still shivering and cold and numb. "I think we could all use some shore leave."


End file.
